Welcome to my super late January income report! What’s funny is I’ve had the video up for a while, click here to watch on Youtube. In this report I’ll let you know how I did as far as online business last month and my plans for the current month.

Why do I share how much I make? While a lot of people find this information truly personal, I really don’t mind talking money. Especially when it comes to something like working from home as an entrepreneur. I want to be able to not only track my progress as my businesses grow, but also show others that you can make money from home. Even as a stay at home mom to a toddler with another baby on the way!
Now let’s get to the good stuff…

In January 2018 I was able to earn $3,544.06 working from home part time!

This total includes a variety of different income streams which I will happily break down for you real quick.

Ebay: Ebay is my main source of income and my main focus. I resell items that I find mostly at thrift stores, but also yard sales, regular retail stores, etc. If I can make a good profit on it, I flip it! You can sign up for eBay here if you don’t already have an account. I honestly started with just items around the house that I didn’t need and reinvested the money I made as I sold it.

 

Poshmark: For selling trendier, younger and more designer clothing items I love using Poshmark. It’s an app (and a website) that I’m really starting to put more focus on. Sign up here using my code AILEENBARKER for $5 off your first purchase.

Mercari: I don’t sell a ton on here, but it’s another app that you can sell pretty much anything on and my favorite part is how low the fees (10%) and shipping are. Anything heavy I like to list on Mercari because the pricing for shipping heavy items is much more reasonable than what I can usually get even directly through the post office. Click here to sign up for Mercari (or download the app in the app store) and use my code MZASRJ to get a $10 credit for your first purchase.

Etsy: Most people know Etsy for handmade items, but that’s not what I sell on there. I actually have two stores: one focuses on vintage items and the other is digital downloads (like printables).

Grow With Me Box: This is a new business of mine that I’m so excited about! It’s a secondhand kids clothing subscription box. If you’d like details you can click here to get to the website. PS use the code HUSTLEANDSLOW for $5 off your first box if you decide to sign up!

Affiliates: This include income through different affiliate programs such as Amazon Affiliates, etc. There are a ton out there, but I mainly use Amazon.

Youtube: I do make a little bit of money on YouTube and it’s been steadily growing which is fun after all the hard work I’ve been putting into it. The money from YouTube comes from ads that play on my videos.

Freelance: Even though this is something I don’t do as much as I used to, I do some freelance work. Mostly virtual assistant type work focusing on the design and technical aspects of it like helping with website or graphic design, etc. This is something I do plan on taking on more of as time goes on. I love that there is practically no overhead and no inventory to manage.

(above screenshot taken from my GoDaddy Bookkeeping account)

Breakdown of January 2018 Online Business Income

Income: $3,544.06
Expenses: $1,869.45
Net Profit: $1,674.61

Because I run a business that sells products my expenses are much higher than most other online businesses that are service or digital product based, for example. But I am trying to keep my expenses low and I’m also trying to grow the other parts of my business where there is no inventory or cost of goods so that I can take home more of my income.

eBay Income Breakdown

Since eBay is my main focus I thought I would take a moment to break down my month on eBay so that I can compare each month.

# of items sold on Ebay: 87
Total sales: $1,718.52
Approximate Cost of Goods: $301.86=
Ebay & Paypal Fees: $247.49
Net Profit: $1,169.17
Net Profit Percentage: 68%
Average Sale Price: $19.75
Average Profit Per Item: $13.43

January on eBay was pretty good considering I’m just getting back into the swing of things and my sales are finally going back up. I am pretty happy with my net profit percentage as well as my average sale price and average profit per item. I try not to buy anything to sell that I can’t make at least $10 profit on. I plan on trying to raise my average profit per item, but $13.43 is definitely above my $10 minimum and I’m more than happy with that for the time being.

In February I’m changing things up on eBay a bit:

1. Removing Best Offer on my listings (a setting where buyers can make an offer on an item) and I’m switching to doing free shipping instead. We’ll see how it goes! I love experimenting with different things to see what works best for my business.
2. Auctions ending daily instead of only doing Buy It Now/Fixed Priced. I find that this is a great way to kind of boost traffic. We’ll see how it goes. I also like to use auctions to move inventory that’s been sitting for a while.
3. When I list new items (most of them) I’ll be listing them for 7 days rather than 30 days the first round and then if they don’t sell I’ll relist for 30 days. The reason for this is I think that items that are ending sooner might have a better chance of being seen.

February Goals

I’m keeping things pretty simple and kind of low in February to be realistic. My due date is mid-March so I know that as I get more and more pregnant and closer to having this baby I will need to slow down quite a bit. I still have goals, but I’m cutting myself a little slack. Then once the baby is born and we’re all settled in a bit you’ll see these goals skyrocket!

• Sell 100 items in Ebay
• $2,200 in Ebay Sales
• $4,000 Total Income (across all income streams)

Again, if you’d like to see a video break down you can click here to watch it on youtube.

So that’s it for this month! If there’s anything that I missed the you’d like me to go over in my next report or if you have any questions at all please comment below!